KIMBELL TRIAL

KIMBELL TRIAL Other testimony Trooper William Phillips, the lead investigator, said he interviewed Thomas Kimbell three times in 1996 and Kimbell denied being near the Dryfuse home. He also denied ever owning a knife, Phillips said. There was previous testimony from a New Castle police officer that Kimbell frequently carried a knife. Phillips said the day Kimbell was arrested, he told Phillips another trooper had him arrested because she had a grudge against him -- and that other trooper "figured it out." Phillips said Kimbell was talking about the murders. Sonya Hasson and Arlene Logan, correction officers at the Lawrence County Jail, testified that Thomas Kimbell got into a shouting match with a female inmate and said, "I'm accused of killing four; you're gonna be my fifth." Peter Michael Karenbauer's testimony from 1998 said that Kimbell told him Bonnie Lou Dryfuse tried to fend him off with a kitchen chair and scraped it on the kitchen ceiling tile. A state police officer testified previously that a white substance found in a damaged chair next to Mrs. Dryfuse's body was consistent with the ceiling tile. Defense Attorney William Leslie asked the judge for an acquittal -- a standard move in a criminal case -- after prosecutors rested their case. Leslie said there was no physical evidence linking Kimbell to the murders and testimony from a jail inmate about Kimbell's talking about the crime was riddled with inconsistencies. Judge Dominick Motto denied the motion for acquittal, saying there was enough evidence that placed Kimbell at the murder scene and the jury would have to weigh the credibility of the rest of the evidence.